Monday, February 4

Today is Monday, and Week 3 of the class is now over. That means the semester is 20% over already - wow! Monday
morning, until noon, is the grace period if you forgot to do any of
the assignments that were due on Friday/Saturday/Sunday.

Working ahead.
Monday is a great day to work ahead! You do not have any
assignments due on Monday, which means you can use this as a chance
to get a head start on the Week 4 assignments that will be due later
this week. In addition, the assignments for future weeks are
available to you now, too. For some of you, midterms
will be starting in your classes next week or the week after - so,
if you get ahead in this class now, you can take a week off here
when the midterms arrive in your other classes.

Week 5 Internet assignment.
For those of you who are working ahead, you will note that the Week
5 Internet assignment is not available yet; you'll need to wait on
that assignment until everybody has gotten their Storybook
coverpages published online, which will be happening later this
week! During Weeks 5-12, the Internet assignment will be available on
the first day of each week (Tuesday) and you will have all week to
complete it. I'll make more information available about all that next
Tuesday, February 12.

Storybook stack. As
always on Monday, I will have a HUGE bunch of assignments in the
Storybook stack that were turned in over the weekend or on Monday
morning. The first thing I will do on Monday morning when I get to work
is to update the list of items in the Storybook stack. So, after 9AM
or so on Monday, you will be able to check the contents of the stack to make sure I received your assignment. I will then start reading the assignments in the order they were turned in. Please DO NOT go on to the Week 4 Storybook assignment until you get Week 3 comments back from me.

Late Storybook assignments.
Each week, the Storybook assignment is the only assignment that can
be turned in late for partial credit. Since I cannot get all the
Storybooks graded and returned immediately, it is fine with me if you
turn in the Storybook late. A Storybook assignment turned in on
Monday after noon can receive up to 8 points credit; if it is turned
in on Tuesday, you can get up to 7 points of credit; on Wednesday, 6
points of credit; the absolute deadline for turning in your
Storybook assignment for partial credit is noon on Thursday, when
you can get up to 5 points of partial credit. So, if you were not
able to turn your Storybook in over the weekend, the sooner you can
turn that in late, the better.

Monday Events on Campus. There will be a "U.S. Department of State Hometown Visit" in Hester Hall Room 160 at 11:30 AM featuring Jim Kuykendall, Tulsa native and Political Officer in the U.S. Consulate General Nuevo Laredo (time/location/details). Find out more about this and other events at the Campus Calendar online.

February 4: Sri Lanka National Day.
Today, February 4, is the holiday that celebrates the day - February 4,
1948 - when the island nation of Sri Lanka gained independence from
British rule (India had gained its independence about six months
earlier, in August of 1947). For those of you who are in the Indian
Epics class, Sri Lanka is a place of special interest, because it is the
legendary home of Ravana the demon king. You can read more about Sri
Lanka in this Wikipedia article, and the image below shows a mountain, Sri Pada,
commonly called "Adam's Peak" in English which supposedly holds the
footprint of the Buddha (according to Buddhist tradition), the footprint
of Shiva (in Hindu tradition) or the footprint of Adam (in Islamic
tradition):